The Gusts of Tomorrow
by widowofthesouth
Summary: The Gusts of Tomorrow is a multi-chapter sequel to Gone With the Wind that picks up immediately with the last chapter of GWTW, with the death of Melanie and Rhett's confession that he no longer loves Scarlett. I do not own the rights to Gone With the Wind or any characters or material in it.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Scarlett poured herself a drink from the cut glass decanter, hands shaking, as she contemplated the future. Even as Rhett's footsteps became imperceptible in the upper hall, she felt a kinship, a belonging, a devotion that she hadn't felt in twenty-eight years. The constant struggle within her ceased, and even though Rhett had calmly and rationally expounded on why he no longer loved her, she felt more at peace than she had in her entire existence.

Rhett's face filled her mind's eye. Rhett's brown tanned skin, Rhett's broad shoulders, Rhett's laughing, black, alert eyes. Oh, it was too much to bear! How much she had missed! The dramatic difference in how her life could have been presented itself to her as she sipped her claret.

He might go in the morning, but he won't stay gone for good, she thought as she paced the burgundy, plush carpeting under her feet. He won't. He's tried to leave me behind for years—why, he just admitted it—and it's never worked. The truth of the matter is, I've broken his heart. It isn't the first time, God knows, but it's going to be the last time whether I win him back or not. The key to fixing this mess lies in my finding ways to be around him without begging or pressuring him to love me. If only he can see that I love him without my pushing him to love me back, he might see that I've changed. But how?

I imagine the surest way to get him to stay is to enlist his help with Melly's funeral. He might not have been able to see her when she was dying, but surely he doesn't mean to leave before she's cold. He's in shock right now. He's not thinking straight. He's lost Melly, he's lost Bonnie, and in a way, he's lost himself. Maybe if he could see me acting like a decent person during the funeral, he could leave for his precious Charleston with a slightly higher opinion of me, and then—then I can go home to Tara to think about the next time Rhett and I cross paths.

Scarlett wanted to pour herself another drink, but she resisted the overwhelming urge. Rhett would out of the house before first light, and she intended to catch him before he departed. She wouldn't burden him anymore with her presence tonight. He probably packed his belongings upstairs with the fear that she would make a scene. No, she'd retire, get a good night's sleep, and face him in the morning with a renewed perspective.

She went up the stairs as silently as she could and tread down the bedroom hallway as lightly as a cat. The door to Rhett's bedroom was cracked. He stood at the foot of his bed, packing silently and efficiently. She sought his face for emotion, but it was blank, impassive, and weary. She longed to run to him, to stroke his tired face, to try to remove all vestiges of the grief she had put there, but she knew better.

She couldn't do anything to scare him away tonight. If she so much as set a foot in his bedroom, he'd depart and it would be months before she laid eyes on him again.

She watched as he carefully picked up a doll that had been Bonnie's and regarded it. The hair was a tangled mess, and a black spot marred one ivory cheek. The lace that she had whipped onto the doll's blue satin dress at Bonnie's insistence was coming loose. Bonne had adored the doll, toted it everywhere in her chubby, little hands, and slept with it whenever Rhett was away on business. With a pang, Scarlett realized the doll, with her odd mixture of beauty and scrappiness, could very well pass as a miniature of her daughter.

Bonnie. If only she had her daughter back, there would be a sure chance for her and Rhett! He'd tolerate her until the ends of time if it made Bonnie happy. What a shame that Ella and Wade were not Rhett's! The important thing was Rhett cared about them, and even if he wished to forget her completely, he took his role as a step-father seriously and would want to occasionally see them. How said that they'd rather see Rhett than her! They were no longer small, well past the opportunity of developing a bond with their mother, and regarded her with bashful eyes when she was near. Scarlett pressed her lips together at the thought.

I may have gotten everyone through hard times, she thought, but at what cost to them? And what cost to me?

Rhett tucked the doll tenderly into his bag. Scarlett crept swiftly past his door and ducked into her own bedroom.

It was a sobering room, she realized. The thick carpeting under her feet and the impossibly soft featherbeds to cradle a body that never seemed to forget the aches and pains of hard labor during and after the war seemed lavish and unnecessary when juxtaposed with the gilt paneling and oil paintings all over the walls. It was room meant to be enjoyed by two, but as usual, she'd made everything about her, and as a result, she no longer took solace in the finery of it.

"Get me ready for bed, Lou," Scarlett said. "I want you to take my deep mourning gowns for Bonnie, and pick all the jet beading off them. I only want plain black lace and trim on all of them. Plain black buttons, too. I'll be dealing with Miss Melly's mourners for days, and they'll find plenty to criticize about me so I suppose I'll dress as tacky and plain as them so at least there will one less thing for them to complain about.

"I also need to be up before the Captain which will be well before morning light. Am I clear?"

"Yes'm." Lou began brushing out Scarlett's hair.

"And I want you to tell the cook to fix a big breakfast in the main dining room. I know the Captain hasn't been eating breakfast and I've been taking mine in here, but tomorrow will be different."

"Yes'm."

"I'll finish getting myself ready for bed. I want you to take those dresses away right now, and have one made ready for me to wear to breakfast in the morning."

Scarlett was awakened at a time that was still so dark she thought it must be the middle of the night. She had slept soundly, worn out by the combined shock of Melly's passing and Rhett's declaration that he no longer loved her, but with fresh reserves of energy, nervousness animated her spirit. The thought of seeing Melly laid out in Aunt Pitty Pat's parlor along with the idea of seeing Rhett possibly walk out the front doors of their home for good made her more irate than usual as Lou dressed her.

She regarded herself in the mirror. She looked years older than twenty-eight. Worry had creased her forehead, and she was as wan as a ghost. Her emerald green eyes glittered in her white face as she directed Lou on how to fix her unruly hair.

"I look dreadful," she finally proclaimed, "but there's no help for it. Pin it all back in a matronly bun."

There's no one to worry over my appearance now anyway, she thought as she pinched her cheeks for a little color.

Rhett despised rouge, powder, and every kind of beautifying mess she'd brought into the house on Peachtree Street. She wasn't about to put any on today and appear to him as fresh as spring flowers when her dearest friend had passed away and he was trying to abandon her. If she looked like a haint, so be it. Rhett hated pretenses, and he might notice her if she looked natural, even if that meant she looked grief-stricken and heart-broken.

The real problem persisted in how she was going to get him to stay long enough to get her through Melly's funeral. If he'd had a few drinks after he retired for the evening, his temperament might turn nasty and biting when she tried to get him to stay. No, it wouldn't. He hadn't been nasty and biting in months. He regarded her as if she were the snake that might bite. There was no leverage. She had nothing to offer him to entice him to stay. With a grimace, she realized she might as well be a stranger.

Scarlett didn't have to wonder for long how she would run into Rhett. They approached the staircase at the same time, Scarlett blushing, she thought, like a schoolgirl with her discomfort. Rhett's facial expression never changed.

"Good morning, Mrs. Butler," he said solemnly. "It's rather early for you to be up, is it not?"

Scarlett felt herself tremble. She raised her chin.

"Good morning, Rhett. Well, you know, Melly's callers. I can't possibly leave Aunt Pittypat and India to deal with them alone. There aren't enough smelling salts in all of Atlanta to help them through the next few days. You know I'm always toting a weary load."

"I do."

"Well, I had the cook make up breakfast." She eyed the bag in his hand. "You don't have to go running out of the house just because I'm awake. You can eat in the dining room before you head to the depot. I'm not going to fling insults at you just because you're going."

And I see that you were going to depart without so much as a goodbye, she thought. I was right to do things this way. If I know anyone, I know Rhett Butler. I knew he'd run out of here like a rat fleeing a sinking ship.

He regarded her with eyes blacker than the sky outside the windows. He looked emptier than he had the night before. He rested his bag at the bottom of the stairs.

Let me be kind to you, prayed Scarlett. Give me the chance to show you my heart has changed. Don't just walk out of here, and leave me in this mess of my own making.

"Very well. It saves me the trouble of stopping—er, somewhere else, to eat before I leave."

He followed after her to the dining room, hands in his pockets, eyes on the ground.

Scarlett took her customary seat and warily regarded Rhett as he slid into his. How long had it been since they had sat at that very table and eaten a regular meal as husband and wife? Since long before that terrible, drunken night after Ashley's party when he cornered her, scared her with his naked jibes, and then carried her upstairs to something she still didn't understand well. Surely it hadn't been so long!

But it had. Scarlett sighed. They might not have shared a meal in that room since Bonnie was a baby. She took a biscuit and began buttering it and watched with some small hope as Rhett raked several pieces of bacon onto his plate.

"Are you going straight to Charleston?" she asked.

"Yes."

There was no room for comment or question. He didn't want to talk to her, and she couldn't blame him. A knot formed in her throat. She took a bite of her grits while she considered what to say next.

"Are you staying with Mrs. Butler?"

"Yes."

"I'll be at Aunt Pittypat's for the next few days, and then, why, I might go to Tara. Suellen won't be a speck glad to see me, but Mammy and Will will be there. I think Tara will do me good."

"It always has," said Rhett absently, casting an interested glance at the newspaper at his elbow.

"Rhett?"

"I hate to ask, but-"

"But what, Scarlett?"

He looked at her like a cornered animal from across the table.

"It's just—well, Ashley is none too well off, and I know the Wilkeses would rather die than take money from Butlers, but don't you think we ought to offer to cover the costs for burying Melly?"

Rhett pushed away from the table.

"Rhett, she was my dearest friend!"

"You're right. They'd rather die than take our money, but I don't care in the slightest if you want to offer."

"I'm just thinking of my promise to Melly, Rhett. Ashley can't take care of Beau if he spends every cent they have on Melly's hearse and tombstone."

"I doubt the inestimable Mr. Wilkes is thinking much of practicalities right now, Mrs. Butler. But by all means, if you think this fulfills your promise to Miss Melly, who am I to stop you?"

There. That was in Rhett's old vein. There was a faint spark, a crackle to his speech. He seemed annoyed, though goodness knows why. All he'd ever wanted was for her to be kinder to Melly. Handling her funeral would likely be her last opportunity to do something directly for Melly.

"That's very kind of you, Rhett." Scarlett sipped her coffee.

"Kind? We could both trade our lives for hers, and it wouldn't be enough repayment for all she's done for our family!"

Rhett's stare across the table said she was small and insignificant.

Scarlett swallowed. She had no recourse. She had treated Melly horribly right up to the end, and Melly's love for her had transformed her into someone strong and courageous right up to the end.

"I deserved that," she said. "I realized I loved Melly too late, just like I realized a lot of things too late, but I want to do this last thing for her. I don't want to argue, Rhett. Not with you leaving."

He went on eating, paying her little regard. She realized he was about to finish and would leave soon.

"I know you loved her and you couldn't stand to see her when she was ill, but don't you think it would do you good to call at Aunt Pitty's before you left? Melly loved you so, and I do wish you would say goodbye," said Scarlett. "It's the honorable thing to do, and you know Melly thought you quite honorable."

"She's not there anymore, Scarlett. She would never know I came."

"Will you do it for me?

"Surely you jest?"

"I'm not joking with you. You've seen me through every crisis of my life since I was sixteen years old. From my first declaration of love to the burning of Atlanta to my involvement in Frank's death, you've been plying me with strength that I couldn't possess alone. To tell you the truth, Rhett, I don't know how I'll fare without you there."

"Scarlett, why didn't you just ask?"

"I thought you'd hurry out if I did any such thing. I did have to get up hours early to catch you before you slipped away. What was I supposed to think, Rhett? That you'd say yes to me after everything I've done?"

He tossed his napkin on the table. His eyes were dull as he answered her, but his voice sounded more like the Rhett Butler of yesterday.

"Well, my pet, have you ever considered that I'm a scoundrel, too? I certainly can't sit in judgment on you, now can I? This wouldn't be a reconciliation, you know."

"I know that. You've made it very clear that our marriage has regrettably run its course. I'm only asking that you stay with me for the visitation and the funeral. You've been gone from Charleston so long that another few days won't matter in the end. Do this last thing with me, Rhett. Besides, you promised to show up enough to keep the gossip down. I suspect plenty of dowager tongues would wag if you weren't to appear with me just once to these functions."

Rhett's eyes were defeated.

"For once, you are right, Mrs. Butler. I'm going to change into more appropriate attire and then get a fresh shave before we allow Atlanta to silently judge our characters."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

When Rhett joined Scarlett at the carriage, she felt a lump rising in her throat. He was clad in the suit he wore after Bonnie's passing. It fit him untidily, the crisp, clean lines of the suit lying at awkward angles on his drink-thickened body. Even when she used to become riled at him, she had thought him devilishly handsome, but now he was almost a stranger in both mind and body. What had she done to him, she wondered, as he smoothed his cravet and then offered her an impersonal hand to help her in.

"Are you nervous?" she hazarded asking when he climbed in beside her.

"Are Will and Ella not joining us?" he asked, as though he had not heard her question.

"I'll take them to the funeral, but I see no reason why they should have to see Melly in such a state, Rhett," said Scarlett, crisply. "I'd rather them remember her in happier times, when she made forts with them out of furniture and romped with them in the backyard."

"Well, they are your children, not mine, as you've pointed out many times."

Scarlett flinched under his words. What hadn't she said? Her head positively ached with the cutting things she had said to him. There was no wonder he had given up on her.

"For Heaven's sake, Rhett, I shouldn't have said it! You've been a better parent to my children than I've been, and you've been a better father than the children would have gotten had Charles or Frank lived."

"How quaint it is to hear you utter those words, my pet."

Scarlett quickly scanned his face for signs of that old, welcome light returning, but his face was a clean slate. He looked as removed from their situation as the east from the west.

I'm sorry, she thought. I'm sorry for all the things I know I did and for all the things that are so innumerable that you'll never have enough breath or time to enumerate them all. Just give me a chance, Rhett. Let me show you I'm sorry.

She hugged her side of the carriage, but she was close enough to touch him. All she had to do was move her hand the barest inch, and she'd be touching his knee. He smelled like brandy and cigars, leather and newspaper. The scent made her head spin, long to rest within the vise of his arms. They'd known each other for over a decade, married, and born a child, but she couldn't even hold a conversation with him. She was unwelcome to so much as touch his hand. Her stomach clenched, and she wished she'd remembered to have a brandy before they left. How could two people who had been as passionate as they become walled off to each other? Melly and Ashley were advised not to have children, and still, even without the benefit of years of physical intimacy, they had been part and parcel of each other, inseparable and immoveable against the world. How could the man who taught her physical intimacy, awakened her passions, be this far removed from her?

"Rhett?" Her voice shook.

"Hmmm?"

"Nothing."

She shut her eyes against the truth.

* * *

><p>When the carriage stopped and Rhett shook her shoulder, Scarlett opened her eyes. She hadn't been asleep, but it was just as well that Rhett didn't know that. It was galling that they had nothing to say to another, humiliating that she'd mistreated the one person in the world that mattered to her to such a degree that he only tolerated her presence. At least now that they were at Aunt Pitty's house, they would be surrounded by the Old Guard and forced to put on their masks and behave more naturally. Rhett understood their motives and philosophies better than she. Soon it would be almost as if they were man and wife.<p>

She walked just ahead of him on the walkway. He hadn't said anything to her as he helped her down from the carriage. This was her time, her chance, her last opportunity to show him that she was a new woman now. He had to see her strong and calm. This was going to be difficult for him, too. He wouldn't want to see Melly this way either. That was why he hoped Wade and Ella would come—so that he would be forced to be strong for their sakes.

What a fool I am, thought Scarlett. Perhaps I haven't changed as much as I would like. And perhaps he hasn't either. For all his talk of the children, he was using them to shield him today.

As she approached the house, she caught a whiff of something woodsy, floral. Flowers. Aunt Pitty's would be brimful of flowers. Of course. For Melly.

Scarlett's focus switched solely to Melly. Dear Melanie was gone. She paused on the walkway and set her teeth together so her face would cease trembling. It would be better if any one of them had been taken so that the remainders could cluster to Melanie and be comforted by her. She always knew what to say and do, from calming Rhett's crazy rages to her own all too frequent tempests in a teapot. That was why they were all going their separate ways now. Without Melanie to marshall their individual strengths in unity and her love to dissipate the unworthy in them, they were as lost as orphans.

The house blurred through Scarlett's tears.

Rhett paused beside her.

"Yes, Mrs. Butler?" he asked.

She drew her hand across the back of her eyes and wiped the tears away. She cleared her throat that was clogged with unshed tears, and she took a tentative step back toward the carriage.

"I can't go in there and look at her," she whispered.

"Pray, why not?" asked Rhett.

"I just can't. I've lost her and you, and I'm left with Ashley which leaves me as good as alone for I'll be mothering him until one of us dies. I can't go stare into her face and think about what a liar and blackheart I am. I can't!"

Scarlett took another step toward the carriage, and Rhett roughly grabbed her wrist and held it.

"Do you mean to tell me that after all your talk of love and honor, you're going to hastily decamp and go hide? I will not tolerate it, my pet. Not when you've forced me to come here and pay my respects before Ashley Wilkes and the rest of his pathetic crew. Dammit, if you know what's good for you, you'll turn around and march up those front steps."

Carriages were pulling up behind them. Scarlett removed her wrist from Rhett's grasp without making a scene and began walking toward the house.

"I'm scared, Rhett," she whispered.

"With good reason, but the Butlers are made of tougher metal than this," he said.

Scarlett's strength was reinforced by all the weakness in the house once she was inside. Though no more than a dozen people had called, Aunt Pitty was already a wreck, dashing about the parlor in alarm, wheezing her numerous grievances to thin air.

"I don't think I have enough food for the callers," she cried, her fat mouth quavering. "And Scarlett, don't you think it would have been better to lay Melanie out in her own house? They don't have much room, and it might discourage quite so many people coming to pay their last respects. I declare, my nerves—I can't handle it, Scarlett. This is a nightmare. Melanie would know what to do. I haven't been this frazzled since her dear mother passed away."

You've been this frazzled every day of your life, thought Scarlett, grimly. And you're one more person that I'm responsible for. In many ways, coming to Atlanta when poor Charles died was the best and worst thing I ever did.

"It's quite alright, Aunt Pitty," she said, aloud. "You know Ashley wouldn't have been able to bear this in his own home. Why, he'd never sleep again if we held it there. The cook is still working on food for the guests, and my own staff will bringing extra things over in about an hour. There won't be more than a small crowd gathered by then, and you know that Mrs. Merriwether and Mrs. Elsing are bringing roast chicken and aspic. Why don't you go upstairs and rest?"

"I think I shall. I was never cut out for entertaining or wakes, either one. Melly looks so like her mother lying there. I'll never get over it if I live to be one hundred, Scarlett. Oh, where are my smelling salts?"

Pitty's hands waved in the air as she toddled out of the parlor, flinching at the sight of the arriving carriages outside her window.

Without her melodramatic overtures to distract them, the only place to look was at the terribly small casket in front of the fireplace.

Scarlett went to take Rhett's hand, awkwardly drew back her hand when she realized her faux pas, and then stood uncertainly before him. He offered her his elbow, eyes darkly solemn.

"Thank you," she said, accepting it, and feeling prim.

He led them to Melanie's casket. She could feel the hesitance in his strong, masculine frame, sense the reluctance that radiated off of him. He wanted to be there less than she. He was doing this for her. Whether it was out of basic kindness or in honor of their years together, he'd agreed to do it and he'd not disappeared as she'd expected him to. That meant something. What, she wasn't sure, but gratitude made her knees weak as she stood before the plain, wooden box.

Melanie did not look herself. She had never been a beauty, but death had done something to her pale, child-like features. She was sallow, thin, and drawn, but in passing, her face had acquired a graceful dignity that life had never granted it. Scarlett studied her thin, black, arcing brows against the pallor of her white, smooth skin and cherished the clear cut lines of her thin, pink lips. Scarlett looked lower, past the bouquet of yellow and orange chrysanthemums the undertaker had placed between her thin, long fingered hands, to the suggestion of rounding at her stomach.

I was so absorbed in my own problems, in running from Rhett, that I never even noticed, thought Scarlett, sorrowfully. Rhett knew. He understood why she was so happy. What a terrible friend I am. How often I miss the obvious!

"Oh, Melly," she breathed.

In response, Rhett's elbow tightened, almost as if he hugged her hand. She'd forgotten he was there, so stricken was she by Melanie's still body. Scarlett gazed up into his face, and she wasn't surprised when she still found no trace of emotion there.

"Rhett," she said.

"Yes?"

"Thank you for staying with me through this. It would have made Melanie so happy. I—I don't know what I'll do without her to love me."

Rhett looked at her without really seeing her, and Scarlett was scared to move beneath his intense gaze.

He isn't thinking of me. He's thinking of Bonnie or Melly, she thought. It doesn't matter which one. He loved them both.

She raised her free hand and cupped her palm against his cheek.

"I loved her too, my darling," she said aloud. "I have so much love to give you if only you'll let me."

He briefly touched her hand on his cheek, almost tenderly, before he looked at her like he really knew her. He took her hand away and pressed it to her side.

"Don't, Scarlett. Not here. Not now."

"I only wanted to be strong for you the way you've been strong for me all these years," she said as she looked imploringly into his face. "You can take comfort in me."

"There is no comfort in you, my dear."

Scarlett's mouth gaped soundlessly at Rhett.

Ashley entered the room. His clothes looked rumpled, and his crepe armband had slid down onto his forearm. His grey and gold silky curls fell over his forehead as though he just arose from the bed. Violet circles hugged his remote eyes, revealing that sleep was far from the last place he had gone.

Rhett tugged on Scarlett's arm to propel her with him toward Ashley.

"Mr. Wilkes, please accept our condolences on the loss of your late wife," he said, smoothly. "She was a great lady."

Ashley blinked at them several times in the harsh morning sunlight as if he were discerning whether he was having a bad dream.

"Surely you are aware of some of the escapades of my misspent youth," continued Rhett. "Your wife was always the pinnacle of Christian sentiment, treating me as if I were a gentleman worthy of sitting in her parlor. Her influence over me was remarkable, and I shall cherish her gentle memory until the end of my days."

Ashley looked slowly from Scarlett's face to Rhett's as if waking up.

"Scarlett. Rhett. How good of you to come! Melly loved you both so much," he said, slowly, as if awakening from a dream.

"Ashley." Scarlett nearly choked on the dreadful burden of a word. "We would like to do some things for Melly, pay for some things if you'll let us."

"It would be most ignoble should I not tend to my darling wife," mused Ashley. "Melly would expect nothing less of me."

"Of course, Mr. Wilkes," said Rhett, understandingly. "Of course she would want it that way. All we want is to honor Mrs. Wilkes in whatever way you prefer."

Scarlett grew uneasy as she watched Mrs. Merriwether and Mrs. Elsing enter the room. Mrs. Merriwether's stout frame was crammed into a mourning gown that had no doubt first been used during the early days of the war, and she likely prided herself on her economy although it had seen better days twenty pounds ago. Scarlett bristled as their sharp matron's eyes combed over her figure looking for something to criticize. She raised her head proudly. Her dress might be new, but there wasn't a hint of ornamentation to it. No one could say she was putting on airs.

"Hello, Captain Butler," rang Mrs. Elsing's thin voice, graciously.

"Scarlett." Mrs. Merriwether's voice was clipped.

The two figureheads of the Old Guard exchanged pointed looks that made Scarlett want to explode with wrath. She drew closer to Rhett, chatted pleasantly, ignored the rebuffs, and watched the clock.

* * *

><p>"Good gracious, it's finally over," said Scarlett as they disappeared into the recesses of their carriage that evening. "I don't know how I managed it—for Melly, I suppose."<p>

Rhett slid in beside her, removing his coat. He sorted through a pocket and withdrew a flask. Uncapping it quickly, he took a long drink under Scarlett's silent stare.

"I'm sorry. Was I remiss not to offer you some, my pet?"

He held the flask out.

"I do not." Her chin squared in her face. "It was horrible in there. They wanted to fling accusations at me. Had you not been there, I would have been thrown out on my bustle. Why, Melanie was my best friend, and they behaved as though I had no right to be there! And they looked at you as if they pitied you for being married to me."

"The Old Guard died but it never surrenders. You've managed to get under the skins of most of Atlanta's old families. Whereas my newly acquired respectability has offered you a reprieve, Mrs. Butler, I would chance to say the moment I leave town, you ought to head to Tara. Without Melly's skirts to shelter you, I imagine you'll find Atlanta an inhospitable place."

"I can get by without hospitality, thank you. But Rhett? Why did you give up so easily on Ashley accepting our help?"

Scarlett could just make out his shrug in the dark.

"I have a desk at the bank, and he has no head for numbers. I can deposit money in his account, and he'll never come to the conclusion of how it got there. I wasn't even going to have the conversation with him until you broached it, Mrs. Butler."

There I go looking like a simple child again, thought Scarlett. Rhett always has a plan, and it's hundreds of times better than mine. I shamed Ashley by offering him money, and I shamed Rhett by touching him in the parlor. If I didn't know better, I would say I'm making every situation worse. I don't think there's a way to make amends to Rhett or Ashley.

She said nothing for the ride home, letting the darkness of the carriage hide the agony on her face. Rhett didn't bother to help her down when they arrived at the house. He headed to the front door, searching his pockets for his key. As Scarlett climbed down from her seat, her hands encountered something wet on the seat. She raised it to the faint moonlight. Rhett's handkerchief. It was soaked, and when she smelled it, it didn't reek of the whiskey in his flask.

Tears. He'd wept.

Dumbfounded, she went to the house, but he had already made it upstairs when she entered. She made a lonely figure on the red velvet carpeting with the vast, empty rooms regarding her.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Scarlett awoke with sunlight streaming over her, the covers drawn up to her chin. She stretched, slowly savoring the good that a sound sleep had done her exhausted body. If only she had a hot cup of coffee, all would be well. Then a startling realization jolted her from her relaxed state.

Great balls of fire! she thought, sitting up and plucking the covers from her body. It's the day of Melanie's funeral and no one woke me!

She leapt from her mahogany estate bed, and mindless of the servants, she ran lightly down the hall in her nightdress to Rhett's room. She flung open his bedroom door, fear icing over her heart, past caring that he might reprimand her.

The bed was made, the bedspread drawn up neatly over the massive embroidered pillows that she had chosen with such care for the room. She stood in the doorway, staring wordlessly at the empty room. Irritation that she had overslept and given Rhett an opportunity to leave without a goodbye combined with the awestruck realization that in all their years of sleeping apart, she had never set foot in his bedroom or experienced the faintest desire to lay eyes on it. Like most rooms in their house, she'd lost interest in it once she finished decorating it. A part of her wanted to enter and see the objects that Rhett had considered important enough to make a part of his sanctuary, but the empty glass on the bedside table told her everything she needed to know.

He's likely drunk and took off for the depot. Damn his hide!

She turned and ran back to her room, calling for Lou as she went.

"Lace me for the simple black," she said as she ran her fingers through her unruly black hair. "Have you seen Captain Butler?"

"Manigo said he took off right after y'all come home last night," said Lou.

"That doesn't help me any!" spat Scarlett. "Did he say where he was going? When he'd be back?"

"Miz Scarlett, you ain't a chile anymore, and you're old enough to know the Cap'n don't answer to nobody," said Lou with a hint of reproach as she helped Scarlett slip into her dress.

"And haven't I got the lack of gumption to stay with him anyway even though I know it?" retorted Scarlett as she hastily twisted her hair upon her neck and thrust pins through the knot to hold it. "If any of the Wilkeses or Aunt Pittypat inquires after me, you tell them I'll be there as soon as I'm able. I've got to find Captain Butler."

Scarlett flew down the staircase, her skirts bouncing with each missed step. She bit her lip as she crossed the landing, writhing at the thought of the terrible day of her accident, trying not to think of the child she never got to know. It was Rhett's child, too.

I wanted it to be a boy.

The thought sprang to her mind unbidden, and shaking her head to clear the memories, she stood on the front porch of her house, scanning the street for signs of Rhett.

"Where in the world did he go?" she asked aloud. "Surely he didn't take off without so much as a by your leave. Oh, that skunk! He doesn't deserve my love. Oh, yes he does. We were made for each other. No one else would be able to stand either one of us. If I wasn't a lady, what wouldn't I tell that varmint!"

But she was no lady. At her core, she always knew this was true. It was one of the reasons that Rhett used to love her. Ladies seldom held any charms for him. Perhaps that was the answer. Perhaps Rhett wasn't with a lady.

Am I mad? she wondered. Do I dare go there and look that awful creature in the face after everything she's done to try and take him away from me? God's nightgown! I can't believe I'm even considering it.

The truth remained. If he were still in Atlanta, Rhett would be at Belle Watling's house. What had he said about it being soothing to be loved by someone who loves you completely? Belle knew Rhett in a way that she never could. He was unguarded with her, confided in her, and went to her to mourn. They shared each other's business triumphs and enjoyed each other's company in the way that partners should, in every sense of the word.

Except he doesn't love her, Scarlett reminded herself. He's never loved her. She's always been a bandage on a wound. She can lord herself over me all she likes, but it's a hollow victory because she's never had his love.

* * *

><p>Despite her moral resolve, Scarlett felt the clouds of embarrassment gathering over her as she stood on Belle's doorstep and knocked. If Atlanta was against her, then a public appearance at a light woman's home was all that she needed to fall out of permanent favor. What if Rhett should be inside? What if he was treating Belle the way he used to treat her? Scarlett's face fell. There was too much to consider. She began to back away from the doorframe, crimson to the hairline.<p>

The front door opened, and Belle stood in the entryway, the gentle light from within the house making her burnished hair glow faintly. Her eyes showed surprise although her mouth made a thin, straight line as she regarded Scarlett on her doorstep in her sober black gown.

"Well, I always figured this day would come," she remarked, putting her hands on her hips. Her voice held the same rural twang that Scarlett remembered long ago on the hospital steps. "I always thought about what I'd say to you when you came. Are you going to stand there all day or are you going to come in?"

Scarlett wiped her hands on the front of her skirt as she stepped in as if the mere act of entering the abode could soil her. What had all the talk been in the dark days after the war? Weren't there supposed to be wall to wall mirrors and cut glass chandeliers? For all the rumors that had flown about Atlanta, the rooms that Scarlett could see didn't look so very different from the rooms at Tara. She swallowed nervously.

"You've come to a low place if the only person you can think of to get help from is me," remarked Belle, taking a seat at the piano with her back turned to it. She stretched out her arms and rested them on the lid while regarding Scarlett with a gaze that was a mix of pity and dislike.

"Rhett's leaving me," said Scarlett. Her Irish pride coursed through her, and remembering who she was, she met Belle's hard stare with one of her own. "I begged him to stay for Melly's funeral. He agreed at the time, but I can't find him anywhere this morning. I thought you'd naturally know where he is. Is he on his way to Charleston?"

Belle laughed softly to herself at some unknown joke.

"Can I pour you a drink?" she asked. "God knows, you drink more than Rhett does, and you look like you could use one. I'm going to pour myself one. Despite the fact that I've been expecting you, I can't fathom that you're actually here. I see he didn't keep you in the dark as much as he might have."

Belle abandoned her seat on the piano bench and poured herself a generous glass of what appeared to be Madeira. She stood sipping it at the window.

"I don't need a drink," protested Scarlett. "I just want to know where my husband is! If you aren't going to tell me, just be frank about it please, and then I can be on my way!"

"I love him," said Belle. "Did you know that? Not for his money or those funny stories he was always telling. I never understand half the things he says. I never even knew until relatively recently that he came of a fine family in Charleston. It was just—his presence. He did something to me. He made me feel appreciated, not just another customer looking to get his fill of me so that he could stand to look at his wife over the breakfast table the next morning. I don't have the words for it. It—It's just that he's Rhett Butler, and I know it when he enters a room. I don't even have to see him to know when he shows up. The air changes. I've met some men over the years, as you may well imagine, but he's the only man in the world who affects me that way."

"How you do run on," said Scarlett, coldly.

But something in her chest gave way, and she would never look at Belle quite the same way again. Despite her unpolished wording, Scarlett knew how she felt, and even as she seethed with jealousy that Belle had cherished Rhett well before she was able to, she felt a strange sense of gratitude to the woman who had shown her husband genuine love. It was an appalling feeling.

"You can be cold to me, Scarlett. I won't deny you the opportunity," continued Belle, and she drained her glass. "It's in your face that you love him and you're scared to death of it. I've never seen him this way before. You may have missed your chance. But I'm done trying to win Rhett's heart. Oh, I'm sure he'll come running to me when the world wounds him, when things don't work out as he planned, but the fact is, Rhett's heart is kind of limited. He's either going to be with you or he's going to be by himself, but my girlish dreams of settling down with him are over."

"Fiddle-dee-dee. If you love him, you'll never give up on him. We both know that!" said Scarlett, her black brows arching up in frustration.

"And that is where we differ," said Belle. "You haven't been around me enough to know that I've got a motherly heart. I do. I put others first. I've come to the realization that I'm not really what he wants. I love him so much that I just want him to be at peace. If you love him, Scarlett, that might be the kindest thing you can do for him. Let him find his peace."

Scarlett felt tears beading on her lashes, and she impatiently wiped them away.

"I love him. I do! I've tried not to, but I do. If you know where he is, please tell me so that I can at least tell my husband goodbye. We've all three changed, I agree, but I can't go through this life without ever speaking to him again."

"Honey, like most things, the answer is right in front of your face. He's not with me half the time you think he is. If I was a betting woman—and I am—I'd say he's at the cemetery this very minute."

* * *

><p>Scarlett opened the cemetery gate and stepped inside with trepidation. There was Rhett, hands jammed in his pockets against the chill in the morning air, standing in front of the monument that bore the name Bonnie Blue.<p>

"I've had people commending me on my bravery for years, but it all disappears in front of this slab of marble," said Scarlett, going to his side. "I'm too much a coward to visit my own baby."

"I can remember the good times when I'm here," said Rhett. "I can remember her smile, her bubbling little laugh, and remember the stories she used to whisper to me as she fell asleep in my arms at night."

"I thought you'd left town when I woke up this morning," said Scarlett. "I thought I'd never see you again."

"I thought it would be fitting to visit Bonnie one last time before going to Charleston. I thought of telling you before I left the house this morning, but you were sleeping so soundly, I couldn't stand to disturb you. Quite the shocks you've endured lately, my pet."

"You came into my room?"

"Yes."

He said he'd never enter her room again. He'd watched her sleep. A finger of hope radiated through Scarlett's chest. A smile played upon her lips despite her best efforts.

"When will you leave for Charleston?"

"In the morning. I'd hate to leave you utterly alone on the day of Melanie's funeral, and besides that, I might not be in a traveling mood after it either. This gives me an opportunity to flesh out the itinerary for my trip and gather a few more personal papers. I have to commend you, Mrs. Butler. Because you haven't played the melodramatic spouse, I haven't had to flee our home as quickly as I initially thought."

For a moment, Scarlett thought she caught a glimpse of the old humorous gleam in his eyes.

"Oh, Rhett. You know me better than that." She strove to sound light-hearted. "I've never won an argument with you yet, and after twelve years, it's high time to stop trying."

He gazed at Bonnie's tombstone speculatively and turned to Scarlett with a quizzical expression.

"May I ask you something, Scarlett?"

"Yes, Rhett?"

"Do you think about her as much as I do?"

"Oh, I do. I think about our Bonnie, and I think about the baby we didn't have. I sometimes look out our bedroom window, and I imagine him waving his chubby arms as Bonnie runs about."

"You imagined a boy?" The look on Rhett's face was strange, strained.

"Heavens, Rhett! I don't know why I'd say such a thing when we're standing here managing to have a civil conversation. Don't pay any attention to me."

"No, don't apologize. It's the most genuine thing you've ever said to me," he said.

Scarlett didn't reply. She hadn't planned to say it. It had only slipped out as many things she said did. There were other things she'd like to remember to him about Bonnie. They hovered on her tongue as she tried to pick the memory she treasured most, but Rhett touched her shoulder.

"Look," he said.

Pallbearers were removing Melanie's coffin from the hearse. The procession to her grave was beginning. Scarlett's heart suddenly thumped in her throat. The world seemed to be getting smaller and spinning around her.

Rhett offered his hand to her.

"Let us go to her this last," he said.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The house seemed too dark and dreary for it to be mid-afternoon, thought Scarlett as Rhett opened the door for her.

The gaslight flickered excessively, casting long shadows from Scarlett's oversized furniture across her mahogany floors. She shivered and pulled her black wool shawl more closely around herself as she crossed the foyer. After the inexplicably clear, sunny weather for Melanie's funeral, the house seemed appropriate but disconcerting. It put her in mind of the night that Rhett pushed aside all reserve and carried her upstairs to a night of confusion and passion. She'd give anything to relive that strange night.

"What are you thinking, Mrs. Butler?" asked Rhett as he poured himself a drink at the sideboard.

"Oh, I was thinking how gloomy this house is after Melly's funeral."

Without asking, he poured her a neat whiskey as well and put it in her hand. Scarlett watched as he took his in one swallow, and regretfully, she placed hers back on the sideboard.

"At last we agree on something, my pet, but I've always said this is a house with no cheer." He crossed the room to the fireplace and stoked the fire.

"Rhett, I know you said you wouldn't depart until the morning, but what are you going to do in the meanwhile? Are you going out or perhaps going to your room to finish packing?"

Desperation drove her to ask him. After holding hands at Melly's graveside service, she was afraid he would avoid her until it was time for him to go. She wanted to be with him but also didn't want to be forced to beg for his company.

"Have you a suggestion for me, my dear?" asked Rhett, the corner of one lip drawing down sardonically.

For an instant, he reminded Scarlett of the young Rhett so much that she was flustered.

"A suggestion? No, Rhett! Oh, you varmint! Yes, a suggestion, of sorts. It's just that you'll be going in the morning, and I'm sure I'll have plenty of time alone before I make it out to Tara. Do you remember how in the old days we used to sit and talk for hours? Remember how you'd come and sit with me for hours in Aunt Pitty's parlor after Charles died? How we used to pass half a day while I minded the store because Frank didn't know how? Those were the best times I've ever had, and I'll miss talking to you when you're gone. Can we sit and talk? Do say yes!"

Scarlett felt foolish listening to the words coming out of her mouth, but they didn't appear to sound foolish to Rhett as he considered them. He looked thoughtful before sinking into an armchair and crossing his legs, his polished boot gleaming on one knee.

"It sounds no worse than other ways I could pass the time," he remarked as he drew a cigar from his breast pocket and clipped it.

"Do you really mean it?" asked Scarlett, her jaw dropping.

"I do. I'm leaving you, Scarlett, but I'm not an ogre. I can be civil. What would you like to talk about, my pet?" He lit his cigar.

Scarlett drew in her skirts and sat down on the horsehair ottoman near his armchair. She opened her mouth, shut it, and then sat casting about for a topic. To her astonishment, Rhett laughed.

"It isn't that easy, is it?" he asked, chuckling.

She stared at him, wide-eyed, feeling her optimism fading away. How could it be that she didn't have anything to say? Melly and Ashley had plenty to say to one another. Even Ellen and Gerald, despite their innumerable differences, had something to say as they sat across the table from each other in the dining room of Tara in the evenings before prayers.

They shared dark secrets, thought Scarlett miserably, and once a bed, but were now strangers. No, not strangers but—but what? They were like schoolmates once close but now grown distant after many years apart, for their years of occupying the same vast house but living in separate rooms had killed any remnants of physical or emotional intimacy. They were faded characters in foggy memories about each other, and that was all.

"Don't laugh at me. I have plenty to say, Rhett Butler," said Scarlett, arching one black brow over an annoyed pea green eye.

"Pray tell," said Rhett, lazily. "I'm waiting on tenterhooks for your next words."

Scarlett smiled.

"Tell me about the Rhett Butler I don't know."

Her smile grew sweet as she watched him stumble over her words. Seldom had she ever taken him by surprise in twelve years, but she had managed it. She made a faux innocent face, batting her eyelashes as he turned her words over in his mind, and laughed softly.

"The Rhett Butler you don't know?" he repeated.

"Yes, I know the man from the barbecue who isn't received. I'm well acquainted with the dashing blockade runner. He may be my favorite, truth be told. I even know the reformed man, the one who sits in a bank all day and aids the Democrats. That says nothing of who you really are or what you were before I met you."

Scarlett clasped her hands in her lap triumphantly while Rhett blinked at her.

"My pet, you have been associating with me for far too long. Your skill in verbal sparring is starting to equal the master."

"What is it, Rhett? Did you think I was going to beg you to stay? Sir, you got more than you bargained for when we married."

Rhett leaned forward, grunted in agreement, and stubbed out his cigar in the porcelain ashtray before him.

"Indeed, I did. What do you wish to know?"

He waited with amusement for her next words.

"Tell me what you were like as a young man."

"I'm wounded to find you no longer think me young," said Rhett, smoothly.

"Weren't you scared to death when you were expelled from West Point?"

"On the contrary." Rhett shrugged. "I was a bit at loose ends to construct a new life plan because Father had drilled West Point into me from the moment I could walk, but I didn't enjoy my time there. It wasn't as though my dreams were shattered. I'd just as soon spent those formative years exclusively in bars and bordellos as learning military history and battle strategy.

"No, becoming a gambler was a perfect fit for an escapee of the new ranks of the Old Guard. I liked riverboats, had an eye for counting cards, was skilled at reading the nuances of a poker face, and rapaciously enjoyed the women that were attracted to the squalor of it all."

"Fiddle-dee-dee," said Scarlett, thinking of the other women. "You were too young not to have some doubts, Rhett."

"If you say so, my dear," smiled Rhett. "Is this a fair game? Do I get a turn, Mrs. Butler?"

"It isn't a game," said Scarlett, slightly ruffled. "And I doubt there's anything you don't know about me. I wasn't much more than a child when we met."

"Everything's a game to a professional gambler," protested Rhett, "and there's plenty I don't know you about you. Will you answer a question since you're intent on baring my secret heart?"

"I suppose." Scarlett looked at him curiously.

"When did your obsession with the honorable Mr. Wilkes begin? At what moment in your sheltered, privileged youth did you look at him and the inexorable love begin?"

"I was quite young," said Scarlett, finishing her drink, and taking comfort in the way the alcohol burned a steady path down her throat and past her stomach, into her legs and toes. "I was too young to know my own mind, didn't even realize yet that I had a mind. But Ashley had just returned home from a tour of Europe. I remember how I stood on the front porch of Tara with no more thought about his visit than worrying that my dress would look too childish to all the callers coming to Tara that afternoon.

"He strode up the steps, swept off his hat, and bent low over my hand. His silvery blond hair caught the sunlight, and his blue eyes were just beautiful, Rhett. They didn't look anything like what you've grown accustomed to since the war. They gleamed with a self-assured kind of—confidence, I suppose. He valued the world he lived in. He loved it with all his might for what it was.

"I hadn't ever met anyone like him before. He made the Tarleton boys look like ignorant puppies gamboling about, and he made the Fontaines look crazy. Either of those families would have been better suited to me, but I didn't know. I was too young to know how selfish I was, and I didn't realize that I didn't care a fig about honor. I didn't know I would grow to despise him when our world passed away, and he would be too weak to survive in the next. Ashley unwittingly became the standard for everyone in my life that day. I was fascinated by what I could have become."

"Those are chilling words," said Rhett, soberly, his black eyes speculative. "I wonder what our lives might have been had I, a rogue Southern boy, appeared on your porch fresh from a knife fight in California. You were impressionable enough in those days that we might have worked, Mrs. Butler."

"I don't know, Rhett," said Scarlett, a dimple appearing briefly. "I don't think you were rich back then."

He laughed loudly.

"Indeed! Well, it was a nice nostalgic daydream even if I wasn't quite so rich in those days. What else do you wish to know?"

Scarlett thought hard.

"The little boy in New Orleans. Your ward. Are you still taking care of him?"

"Yes."

"Is he yours?"

Scarlett chewed her tongue and felt her heart hammer away against her stays while she waited for the answer. She didn't know what she hoped to hear. The idea of Rhett having a child to love despite Bonnie's absence was comforting while the idea of Rhett sharing a child with another woman set her heart afire. He gazed at her as if trying to discern the thoughts behind her question.

"No, he's not my child."

Scarlett felt her chest relax and expand.

"Whose is he then?"

Rhett smiled.

"That, my dear, is a Butler family secret."

"I'm a Butler," she said, lowering her lashes.

Her heart was too full to argue with him though. If Rhett's mind wasn't preoccupied with another woman who had borne him a child, that was enough for her.

He laughed again, shortly.

"So you are, my dear, and I'm still not divulging his parentage."

Rhett arose from his seat with a knowing grin, and he poured himself another drink. He took the decanter and refilled Scarlett's glass as well.

"What is your favorite memory of Miss Melly?" he asked, frankly, as he handed her the glass.

"I don't want to think about that today," said Scarlett. "My head hurts and my heart hurts. If I think about Melly today, I'll go crazy. It all comes down to the same thing in the end. I'm stuck with Ashley for the rest of my life if I honor Melanie's last wishes. And given that I was a blackheart concerning her, I should honor her wishes. It's an appropriate punishment to be saddled with him."

"You've lived with Melly for most of your adult life," pressed Rhett. "Today was her day, and I want to have some remembrance of her. She saw me at my lowest points which I hated for her sake. I'd like to be able to think of her in other ways than my poor comforter when I was a torment to her."

"She never thought of you that way," said Scarlett. "She loved you."

"I hope so."

"She had a keen sense of humor even when I thought she was a fool. I passed out from exhaustion after we put out the fire at Tara that the Yankees set. She looked at me all covered in soot and said I looked like the end man in a minstrel show. And she and Ashley were forever quoting Shakespeare although I never understood why, but once Ashley got himself in trouble by sampling her sweet potato pie. It was meant for company, and for once he was a rogue and denied it steadfastly to the end. She said she thought he doth protest too much. He laughed until he cried and had to go without pie for a month because she knew he'd taken a slice."

Rhett's eyes gleamed over her recollections, an easy, natural smile on his lips.

"Go on," he said.

"I remember once she was longing for something pretty to wear on her wedding anniversary with Ashley. It wasn't long after we'd married. I sent over one of my party frocks, a green and ivory brocade. It was a low-necked dancing dress that she'd never dream of wearing, but it was the nicest gown I owned. I wanted to impress her.

"She decided to humor me and try it on. Well, she was no bigger than a child almost. When she came out, it was fairly hanging off of her with such a plunging necklace, and she told me it was the nicest skirt she'd ever seen but where was the bodice?"

Scarlett laughed with mirth at the memory.

"You knew you loved her," said Rhett, appraisingly.

"Of course I loved her! I just thought I coveted her spouse. I hope she never suspected, Rhett. If God is merciful, my love for her was all she ever saw."

"When did you know you loved her?"

"After we went to Tara. She was so frail she could barely keep body and soul together, but she worked as hard as one of Pa's darkies in the fields. And she was ready to die protecting me when the Yankees came and then when the Yankee intruder came. I grudged her the love, but I loved her.

"Let's not talk about these things. They're too dark, and I don't like them. Let's do something fun. Will you show me your room?"

"Will I show you my room?"

"Well, yes." Scarlett blushed. "I didn't mean it that way! I realized when you weren't here this morning that I'd never set foot in it after you moved in. I'd like to see it."

"I dare not refuse you," said Rhett. He stood and gestured up the staircase. "After you, madam."

* * *

><p>"It isn't what I thought it would be," said Scarlett, wrinkling her nose, when he'd ushered her into the room.<p>

"What did you imagine?"

"I don't know. It's too simple."

"Oh, contraire. No room in this house is simple. The furniture, carpeting, draperies, and artwork are all expressly your choices."

"I don't mean that. I meant that you didn't put many belongings in here to make it yours, to put your hallmark on the room," said Scarlett.

Rhett shrugged negligently.

"It isn't my house, my dear. I only paid for it."

"Don't be mean, Rhett. I just don't see anything that belongs to you."

He wandered over to his dresser and removed a maple box from the top of it. He crossed the room back to Scarlett and thrust it in her hands.

"A writing desk. It belonged to my father and was one of sadly few possessions he gave me during the fleeting years that I pleased him. It went with me to California, back to the Mississippi River, and went on my boat when I was a blockade runner."

He rummaged through a bureau, sorting energetically, and emerged with a handkerchief. The embroidery on it was unraveling, the hem tattered. Scarlett thought it smelled faintly of gardenias and cinnamon.

"My mother's," said Rhett. "This was her favorite handkerchief. She couldn't afford any after the war, and I took this one as an example and bought her a whole box of them."

"Did you bring anything to remind you of me?" asked Scarlett.

"Yes, Mrs. Butler," jibbed Rhett. "The love that burns in my heart night and day for you."

"Oh, Rhett, do be serious."

He pointed to the writing desk that she held. She opened it with trepidation, not sure if she would be flattered by what she found.

Inside was a picture of them on their wedding day. Her heart throbbed painfully. She stood resplendent in her wedding finery, gazing unflinchingly at the camera, her chin raised high. Rhett stared at her instead. Rhett looked so young, so carefree, so completely enamored with her, that she wondered how she could have been so willfully blind for so long.

He looks like a different man, she thought. Look how crisp and alive his hair is, how wide his grin is. He looks no more than twenty-five, and now he looks ten years older than he is.

"I haven't seen this in years," Scarlett said, holding it up to the lamp so she could better see.

"I would have shown it to you had I known it interested you." Rhett's voice was offhand.

"Why did you marry me?" asked Scarlett, just to see what he would say.

"Why to keep you for a pet, my dear."

They talked all through the night, boldly reliving the dark days of Atlanta's fall, wandering through the rice paddies of Charleston, and dissecting Scarlett's relentless but abandoned passion for Ashley. They forgot to go down for supper but poured fresh drinks instead. A hysterical conversation centering on the worst things that Scarlett ever did to Suellen came about, and Scarlett insisted that marrying Frank Kennedy didn't make the list.

Before Scarlett knew it, late night had fallen on the house and her head was spinning from an empty stomach and too much liquor. She fell against Rhett's pillows, drowsily, the hum of crickets outside their window sending her off to slumber. She felt Rhett pull the coverlet up to her chin.

"It was a good last night, Scarlett," murmured Rhett.

"But there was so much left to talk about," she said, sleepily. "I wanted to talk more about Bonnie, find out about Belle, and hear more about your blockade running."

He pressed Bonnie's doll into her hands.

"Maybe this will give you sweet dreams, Mrs. Butler," he whispered.

She awoke in what could have only been minutes or hours. She'd been dreaming of standing on Tara's red earth with Rhett. The cotton was springing to life before her eyes, and Rhett looked well again. She didn't want to awaken. She wanted to see if he'd kiss her under the summer sun.

Rhett shook her elbow.

"Wake up. I have to go."

Scarlett rubbed her bleary eyes and found Bonnie's doll was no longer in her arms.

"Why? It can't be morning yet. Must you leave so soon, Rhett?"

She couldn't distinctly see him for the sleep in her eyes and the beginnings of what she suspected would be a hangover.

"It's morning, just not the hours you keep. I want to leave things as good as they were last night," he whispered in the darkness.

"They could keep on being this good, I promise."

Rhett pressed a kiss to her forehead.

"You know that isn't so, my pet. We're not the Wilkeses of the world, now are we? No, we can't sit at home and hope merely to be loved. There's no thrill there for us. No, for us the joy is found in the pursuit, in the tension, in the dozens of "what ifs" that abound."

She sat up.

"We could be happy now if we tried, Rhett."

"Come, Scarlett. Do you believe that? Is having each other as good as wanting each other? No, I promised I'd be back to keep the gossip down. I won't disappear without notice. Do you know how to reach me in Charleston?"

Scarlett nodded in mute misery.

"You'll hear from me soon."

"Be safe, Rhett. I love you."

"I would that it were enough for us."

His stride from the room was heavy and quick. Too stunned for tears, Scarlett curled up on her side. The covers were mussed on his side of the bed, and there was an indentation on the pillow beside her. She put her head where his had been and slept.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Scarlett stopped by Ashley and Melly's home but no one answered her knocks. She peered in the low windows to ascertain that Ashley wasn't sprawled in the floor, and with that burden off her conscience, she sought him at the mills. The foreman scratched his head and told her that he hadn't laid eyes on Mr. Wilkes since the day Mrs. Wilkes died, and that his sister had stopped by to tell them that Mr. Wilkes would be at his aunt's home until he was feeling better. Scarlett thanked the foreman with a sinking heart and set off in her carriage with a tureen of chicken soup and a hot pan of rolls, all prepared by her cook. While it was true that Aunt Pittypat and India Wilkes had been more manageable in the aftermath of Melanie's death than she had originally hoped, it would be easier to tell how Ashley was doing without their hovering, nervous presences.

"Why, it's Scarlett," said Aunt Pittypat through the infinitesimal crack in the door as she peered out. She opened the door wider. "Do come in. Ah, is that soup I smell? And rolls, too! We're all famished. I can't put mind to cooking with Melly on my mind night and day, and you know poor India can't cook a thing. It doesn't matter a bit, dear, because darling Ashley can't keep anything down. How glad I am to have a square meal!"

The older lady pounced on the food in Scarlett's arms and bustled off cheerfully to the dining room where Scarlett could hear her calling for Cookie to set the table and serve the food as soon as possible. Scarlett stood irritably in the entry, wondering if that was her cue to leave or if it was now permissible to go through the house and seek Ashley out. Well, India could pitch her into the street if she found her presence undesirable. She was here for Melly. She went into the parlor and found Ashley sitting at the window, looking dejected.

"Ashley, darling. May I come in?" asked Scarlett.

Ashley sat up in his chair, his clothing stained and rumpled. The way his hair clustered over and then stuck to his forehead said that it hadn't been washed since Melanie died. His cheeks hollowed in, the bones sticking out, and the lines around his mouth went down to his chin like deep slashes. Scarlett incredulously reflected that he hadn't looked like such a scarecrow when he returned to Tara after the war.

"Scarlett, of course. Come in," he said in his elegant drawl.

"Ashley, I—I—I came to check on you and Beau. I brought soup."

Soup, she thought. What a comfort. He's lost his mainstay, and I'm offering him broth. Oh, I wish I wasn't stuck with him. I wish it were anyone but him! I'd rather kiss Sherman himself than be stuck acting as nursemaid to this helpless creature. Melly, why did you have to make Ashley my cross to bear? Wasn't your love for me enough of a burden to live with?

"Beau." Ashley's brow furrowed. "I believe India sent him back to school, Scarlett. I apologize, my dear. I really don't recall. Everything is so—dim and vague these days."

"Of course, it is," said Scarlett, gently. "Ashley, I know how you loved Melly, but she wouldn't want you to sicken yourself over her in this way. She's looking to us to lead happy lives and look after Beau. Tell me, dearest, what do I need to do to help you?"

"I don't know." Ashley's eyes were remote as he turned them on Scarlett. "For the life of me, I don't know! I know she's not here anymore, but somehow I feel her quiet, strong presence all about me. Scarlett, everything I ever did, I did for Melanie's sake, and now she's gone and left a shell of a man."

"No. No, don't say that," implored Scarlett, going to him. "It will be difficult, but you have to find something in this life that you treasure almost as much as her and cling to it with all your might, my brave heart."

Ashley shook his head miserably, unshed tears threatening to spill from his eyes.

"I always loved her so and fit my ideals to hers. Now I scarcely know where her thoughts and beliefs began and mine ended," he said, softly. "Even when she was only a girl, she was so gentle and wise beyond her years. I thought the Cause was a waste, but she believed in it so I went and fought for Melanie. She was my Cause. She guided me through every milestone in my life, and now that she is gone, I feel that I am gone, too. This man you're looking at, Scarlett, he's nothing more than a ghost of days long dead."

"No, Ashley. You mustn't say these things. We don't want to grieve Melanie. She's earned her rest. She needs to see us banding together with strength and fighting past the grief. She used to say she and I were like two soldiers against the world, and even though she's not with us, I still feel her love."

Ashley sighed.

"Look at you with all your fire and strength. I envy you, Scarlett. Times may change, but you adapt and thrive. Nothing has ever humbled you or gotten the best of you. I would that I had some of your hardiness."

"Oh, Ashley, that's not true." Scarlett wiped her eyes.

"It is true. From the burning of Atlanta to paying the taxes on Tara, you've been indefatigable in your triumphs. You'll never be winnowed out. In fifty years, you'll be stronger than you are now while I shall be still weaker."

"Ashley, that's not true. Rhett—he's left me. He went to Charleston."

"He'll be back. He's left countless times over the years," mused Ashley, easily.

"He says he doesn't love me anymore."

"Given that he never bothered to actually tell you that he loved you, I don't count that as the cutting remark that you do," retorted Ashley with the first spark of anger that she'd seen in him in weeks.

"Rhett's not like other men," protested Scarlett.

"He's not as unique as he believes himself, and the fact that he lives life on his own terms doesn't leave him exempt of social niceties in love and death. If he loved you, he should have been brave enough to say it since he was so very brazen about drawing attention to his boldness in all other aspects of life. The fearless duelist and blockader couldn't bring himself to tell the truth to one small person, and then he blames her and abandons her in the catastrophe of his own creation." Ashley shook his head. "Pardon me for saying so, Scarlett, but I find him to be a singular coward."

"It isn't completely his fault! I persisted in trying to hurt him, to humble him. Ashley, I—I refused him his marital rights." Scarlett blushed, scandalized at her own admission.

"Had he accorded you an ounce of the tenderness or love a woman craves, he may have found you quite willing to provide him with all that he desired."

"Oh, let's not speak of this!" Scarlett put her hands to her ears for a moment to stop the flow of words. "The truth remains. I love him, and he's gone, I believe, just as permanently as Melly is gone although he still lives."

"What shall you do, Scarlett?"

"What I always do in times of need. I'll go to Tara. I came to check on you today because I plan on leaving in the morning. I shall take Wade and Ella with me."

"Will Suellen let you in the doors?"

"She better. I keep the place up, don't I?" said Scarlett, crossly. "It's still my home, too, and I mean to enjoy it whenever I wish."

"Ashley, there's hot soup and bread in the dining room," said India, coming into the parlor. She stopped short when she saw Scarlett at the window with her brother. Words died away on her lips.

"Good morning, India," said Scarlett, stiffly.

"Scarlett."

The smile on India's thin, pale lips died as suddenly as it had appeared. Her colorless eyes and lashes looked dead in her wan face. The effect was only heightened by the shabby mourning she wore. Scarlett's detail-oriented eyes noticed a button was missing, and the trim was coming free of its stitching on one wrist.

She hasn't forgotten what a help I was to her in her time of need, thought Scarlett. They would have never been able to afford food for all the mourners on their own, and she was incapable of helping with the funeral arrangements. She's beholden to me for my kindness, and it makes her despise me twice as much as she would if I had just insulted her or assaulted her. She'd rather have walked in here to find me in a passionate embrace with her ailing brother more than anything because then she'd get the pleasure of running me down to the Old Guard. Well, I shan't give her the satisfaction of setting one foot wrong around her ever again.

"Ashley is not well enough to entertain callers for long periods of time," said India, her chin jutting out stubbornly. "He is prostrate with grief and requires frequent rest."

"India, I'm fine," chided Ashley. "I'm not entertaining Scarlett. She's family."

India's pale eyes flashed with hate at the endearment.

"I agree, India," Scarlett said, sweetly. "I shan't be here a moment longer. I only wished to inquire after Beau and Ashley's well-being."

India blinked rapidly, Scarlett's words stunning her.

Scarlett reflected, with concealed pride, that it was probably the first time in her spinster life that anyone had agreed with India.

"I'll be on my way out," said Scarlett, retrieving her parasol and making her way to the parlor door.

"Wait," said Ashley, abruptly. "Take me with you!"

"Brother!" cried India.

"Excuse me?" said Scarlett. "I can't take you home."

"No, not to your house," replied Ashley, quickly, as though all of his courage was being poured out through his words. "To Tara. I want to go to Tara with you."

"No, Ashley!" cried India. "It wasn't that long ago that you and Melanie were living at Tara. I remember your letters! You hated it there, despised everything about it. What on earth could make you want to return?"

"There's nothing there for you," said Scarlett. "It's just a country farm. Suellen and Will are still there, of course, and Mammy along with Prissy and Dilcey. What do you want? To be reminded of the times we nearly starved to death?"

"Missing Melly as I do makes me yearn for the old days," said Ashley, smiling his old, drowsy smile. "I want to walk the old country roads I used to walk with her. I want to look at the ruin that was once Twelve Oaks, maybe bring back a keepsake for my office here. I want to see the old world that used to make me feel safe and whole."

Scarlett looked beseechingly at India, her dark brows raised in alarmed peaks.

"Tell him no," she mouthed.

India looked perplexed and stunned.

"But the mills," said India. "They're a full time enterprise, you've said so yourself. And you've neglected them terribly in this time although I'll be the first to say it's your right, Ashley. You can't go to Tara now. There's nothing to gain."

"It will be the same hard work it's always been," Scarlett continued. "There's never any food to go around, and the work never ends."

"Then why are you going?" asked Ashley, the ghost of a smile playing on his sensitive mouth.

Why was she going? Because she missed the red earth that was as much her mother as Ellen. Because she wished to stand at Gerald and Ellen's graves and hoped to walk away with some of his strength and her grace. Because she wished to put her arms around Mammy and cry about Rhett. Because she told Rhett she was going there, and if he wished to visit her or correspond with her, Tara would be the first place he sought her. Because for all her desire to shut everything unpleasant out, Tara would be the only place that she could confront her demons and rise up stronger for it.

"Ask me anything," said Scarlett. "Ask me anything, and I swear that I'll grant it. But don't ask me that. You know why I'm going, and I have to go alone. Listen to reason. Listen to India. Your place is here with your son, working at the mill, securing your futures. This isn't the time for you to dream of the past, Ashley."

"If you disappear to Tara with her, it will give credence to all the rumors about you," said India, her voice cutting like a knife.

Scarlett flushed.

She hadn't bet on India speaking that way to Ashley, but if it worked, if it kept him in Atlanta, she'd be grateful to her for the rest of her life.

"No one who loved Melanie would ever listen to them," said Ashley. "India, I intend on departing with Scarlett in the morning. Will you look after Beau or not?"

India's eyes gleamed like icy metal in her set face.

"Oh, I will, Ashley. I will," she said. "And when Scarlett ruins your reputation and you're no longer comfortable returning to Atlanta because you've forsaken the memory of the fine wife you once had, I'll still be here looking after Beau. What has happened to you, Ashley?"

India darted from the room crying, leaving Ashley and Scarlett looking at the spot she had only moments before seemed rooted to.

"Ashley, I will never close the hospitality of Tara to you," said Scarlett, pleadingly. "But please, must you do this? Think of us!"

"I am thinking of us, my dear," said Ashley, quietly.

* * *

><p><strong>Thank you for your encouragement, readers. It lifts my spirits when you take a moment to send me your thoughts. I fear you are in for quite a long ride though. These characters were put through the wringer in GWTW, and they won't find resolution soon even though I long for the same happy ending that you do. Thank you all!<strong>


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